Calgary continues to tally effect of the flood's damage (with video)

Sherri Zickefoose and Tamara Gignac, Calgary Herald06.29.2013

Married couple and Bowness residents Sharon Raycroft and Geoff Wilcox stand in the front lawn of their condemned home in flood affected Bowness in Calgary, Alberta Friday, June 28, 2013. They have been given permission to demolish their flood damaged home.

The city hasn’t finished tallying the damage caused by last week’s flooding, but already officials are saying as many as 10,000 Calgarians won’t be able to live in their homes anytime soon.

Emergency chief Bruce Burrell delivered that message Friday, providing a sobering reminder that many in the city face a long recovery even as others gear up to celebrate Canada Day and look forward to the Calgary Stampede.

“We believe we’re talking about 8,000 to 10,000 people that are going to be out of their homes for a significant period of time,” said Burrell, director of the Calgary Emergency Management Agency.

“All these inspiring videos and that, it’s great to see everyone chipping in and helping out. But we’ve (got) a lot of people that this is going to take a very traumatic toll on.”

Burrell’s estimate notwithstanding, Mayor Naheed Nenshi said it will be five days to a week before the city will have a strong idea of how many homes and buildings will be lost.

“It’s certainly true some people will not be able to move home, and it’s certainly true that some will choose not to move home based on the cost of the damage.”

The city hasn’t yet sent the province a detailed request for disaster funding.

“We’re not close yet. Clearly it is a provincial responsibility to take care of this — I’m taking the premier at her word that the province will look after it,” Nenshi said.

Meanwhile, residents in various parts of the city have already done their own reckoning.

For Sharon Raycroft and Geoff Wilcox, their house was a “cottage in the city,” built to last in 1947.

But the charming woodframe Bowness bungalow was no match for the flood of the century: Inspectors have deemed it uninhabitable, and Raycroft and Wilcox have no choice but to tear it down.

“When we bought it, there wasn’t a crack on the wall. It was a solid, solid house,” said Wilcox.

Now, much of the property’s foundation wall has caved in and it is unsafe to live in. The couple managed to salvage a few things — half of their garage is filled with boxes.

But like so many thousands of people across the city, most of their belongings are gone.

And soon, nothing will remain of the little white home that sat unchanged for decades, even as modern infills sprung up around it on picturesque Bow Crescent.

Over the years, the married couple considered demolishing it and building something bigger. But they loved the old property for all of its quirks and couldn’t bring themselves to do it.

For 21 years, they painstakingly renovated the property, building a master bedroom in the attic that overlooked the river and the massive Manitoba maples in the backyard.

“It doesn’t look like much from the outside, but it really is the most charming little house,” said Raycroft. “It was so comfortable. When we had lots of friends over, we really used the yard, with people spilling in and out.”

The pair isn’t sure if they will rebuild on the site, but they don’t want to leave the area.

“We’ve lost a lot of things, but we haven’t lost Bow Crescent,” said Raycroft.

“And I’ve still got my parents’ old piano. It took six guys to get it out. My mother was a piano teacher and my dad loved to play. It keeps me connected to them — and that’s more important than a house or a bunch of photographs.”

Crews from the city and brought in from elsewhere will check the structural integrity of 2,400 water-damaged homes, to see which ones must be condemned.

Canada Task Force 1 arrived Thursday from Vancouver to help pump water out of homes and buildings, and assess damaged dwellings.

Set up in a tent city at the city’s northeast multi-agency training facility, the task force of volunteers is a self-sustaining support group with its own kitchen, showers and water purification capabilities.

“The goal of our team is coming to a community and start helping without taxing its resources,” said Task Force 2 leader Scott Cowan.

Calgary has seen the help of 150 Edmonton firefighters, two dozen volunteers from Task Force 1, and others from Alberta.

Nenshi had high praise for the task force, especially in light of federal funding cuts to the program.

“It does amazing work and it’s really cost effective,” said Nenshi.

In the city core, authorities are expecting to have electricity restored to downtown and the East Village by noon Saturday, returning power to 190 properties.

Plans to move evacuees out of city recreation centres signal another move toward restoring things to normal.

The measure is to allow the recreation department to start summer day camp programs, but Nenshi said the number of people who continue to need shelter is shrinking.

“Some people won’t be relocated because they’re now able to go home, and hopefully that’s a very large number of people,” said Nenshi.

Space is being found elsewhere, including the University of Calgary.

Nenshi urged Calgarians to spend their long weekend volunteering with flood relief.

“Even if it feels like the emergency has passed, your neighbours still need you,” he said.

But the city has also set aside some time to celebrate, and Nenshi wants Canada Day Monday to mark a turning point in the disaster and toast the spirit of tireless volunteer efforts.

“We’re confident that we’re on the path to recovery. We’ve hit a milestone and it’s going to be fabulous,” Nenshi said.

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